


The Wolf Pack

by GloriaMundi



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Spoilers, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-15
Updated: 2016-05-15
Packaged: 2018-06-08 15:47:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6861286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GloriaMundi/pseuds/GloriaMundi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Canonical 5+1: winter soldiers</p><p>Spoilers for <i>Captain America: Civil War</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Wolf Pack

After the fuck-up in Turkmenistan where they lost Ilya, the squad's morale was at its lowest ebb. Devis wasn't speaking to any of them: Nurhaci kept asking to spar and beating the shit out of everyone. So by the time they were summoned for the meeting with the Commander, the five remaining members of the squad were all mottled with injuries: nothing serious, of course, even Nurhaci knew better than to cripple anybody when they might be sent out on another mission at any hour. The way things were ...

Kolya was certain that they were going to be split up, so Josef had his hands full dealing with a fatalistic Cossack. "They won't separate us, Kolya. Not now. We work well together."

"Sure, okay, like we did in that shitstorm in Ashgabat. Of course they want to keep us as a team," said Kolya bitterly. "We could fuck up five times as much if they gave us all different assignments."

"Kolya ..."

But there was no time to reassure his comrade: the Commander was ready for them. 

There was a new fellow with him, someone Josef had never seen before. A military man, nothing special to look at, but he wore the Hydra pin on his jacket, next to his medals. He looked at each of the five thoughtfully, assessing them.

"Comrade Karpov," said the Commander, "requires a very special team of operatives." He cleared his throat. "I have put forward your names."

"We will be honoured to serve," said Josef, as was expected.

Comrade Karpov said, "The procedure is medical. It has been used before, with variable results. Only the best survive. Are you the best?"

Josef did not look at Kolya. There was no need. Kolya would not spout his nonsense to the Commander, or to this Karpov.

"We are," he said. 

*

It was a long flight: east, Devis thought, though of course they had not been told where they were going. There were stories of secret bases in Siberia. Hell, there were stories of secret bases all over Russia. All over the world! Perhaps they'd be leaving the Soviet Union, letting it tear itself apart behind them. 

He was proud to have been part of the collapse. Proud to be a part of an organisation that could shape history as it needed to be shaped. But why, why did it have to cost them Ilya? He'd been the best of them: cheerful, kind, fearless. A man who could laugh with a bullet in his gut: a man who could take down a regime with a briefcase and a pistol. Not so kind to their enemies, of course. But kind to Devis.

"What do you think?" said Nadia, nudging him gently. "Will it be the Arctic? Will we ever see the sun again?"

"It was sunny enough in Ashgabat for a lifetime," said Nurhaci irritably, not opening his eyes. "Who cares what it's like where we're going?"

"I care," said Devis. "I like the sun."

"You just want to laze around while the rest of us do the work," said Kolya, vicious as ever. Devis knew that Kolya blamed him for Ilya's death: he'd have to watch his back until Kolya got over it.

He'd never been one to watch his back. Not with his squad.

"Fuck you, you Cossack bastard, you --"

It went downhill from there: quietly, so as not to disturb the crew of the plane, or the Colonel -- Vasily Karpov, it turned out, was a Colonel -- dozing in his seat. Devis knew Kolya's weak points. They all knew each other's weak points. A sharp pinch to that place on his right arm where there was still shrapnel under the skin, and he hushed soon enough.

"Whatever it is, wherever it is," said Nadia, wiping Devis's blood from her cheek, "we'll face it together."

*

Their new home was an obsolete missile silo, one hundred and forty kilometres out of Omyakon. This close to midwinter, there were barely three hours of daylight. The final leg of the journey had been by truck, grinding through a blizzard at less than thirty kilometres per hour. Nadia had not been able to sleep, and the vibration of the engine made her nauseous. She would have liked to rest: but Karpov barely gave them time to stamp the snow from their boots before he brought them into the medical lab.

"Here," he said, "you will become the most dangerous weapon in the world." 

"We are already dangerous," said Nadia, smiling to sweeten this small insubordination.

"Indeed you are," said Karpov, not smiling back. "Tell me, have you heard of Captain America?"

"Of course," said Josef. "He is the tool of the capitalist regime. Of SHIELD."

"This," said Karpov, gesturing at the bag of blue liquid on the nearest IV pole, "is the serum that made Captain America."

"The Americans have claimed that it was destroyed," Nadia pointed out. "If they still have it, why have they not made whole armies of big blond heroes?"

"It took me a long time to uncover its existence," Karpov told them, "and longer still to extract it from the clutches of the scientist who was working on it."

"Then ... it is new? Fresh?" Nadia was puzzled. "Captain America died nearly forty years ago. Have they found his body?"

"I believe this was recreated from blood samples," said Karpov. "At any rate, the Americans no longer have it: we do. You five will be the recipients. You will be the wolf-pack of Hydra."

And you, comrade, thought Nadia, you will be the hand that holds our leashes.

*   
The days after the serum were bad days. Nurhaci had seen his comrades in pain before: had caused it, and endured it himself. This was different. This was -- he felt as though some alien thing, something non-human, was being forced into his veins from the small blue sachet. "It's only blood," said Nadia. "It's just like having a transfusion." But Captain America surely did not bleed blue. And there was ice in this, ice through his whole body, freezing him inside and out. Freezing his heart, his guts, his mind.

In the great chamber of the silo there were six capsules. When Nurhaci was able to walk unaided, he found his way there -- his door had been locked, but the lock was weak and so were the guards -- and acquainted himself with the layout of the place.

One capsule was operational. The glass shielding was closed, and he could make out the outline of a man behind the fretwork of ice.

"He is your older brother," came Karpov's voice behind him.

Nurhaci did not tense -- he did not need to tense to prepare for a fight -- but he readied himself. "My brother?" he said lightly, thinking of the boys he had left behind, long ago, in Svobodny. 

"It was he who brought the serum to me," said Karpov. Stepping carefully, he came round into Nurhaci's field of vision. "He has been the Fist of Hydra for many years."

"He must be an old man," said Nurhaci, squinting to see if he could make out the shape of the fabled metal arm. He had heard of this man.

"He does not age," said Karpov. "As you will not age, now that the serum flows in your veins."

"We will live forever?" said Nurhaci.

"You will live until you are killed," said Colonel Karpov. "As will he."

*

The Fist of Hydra woke only slowly from cryostasis. He screamed a lot as he thawed. Kolya and his squad -- the wolf-pack -- were allowed to watch, from the observation room behind the tempered glass window. 

"It will not be like this for you," Karpov had promised them. "The serum that you were given is much more advanced. But you should know how it would have been, if we could still only use the original formula."

Kolya did not believe the Colonel, but he did not say so.

The guards had to carry the Fist of Hydra to the chair in the middle of the chamber. They treated him roughly, but did not seem especially afraid of him. He was a big man, and the metal arm -- a fearsome and a wondrous thing! -- must have added to his weight. The guards strapped him into the chair, and Karpov stepped forward with the little red book that he carried everywhere.

"Longing," he read. "Rusted."

Kolya was puzzled. Why was the Fist of Hydra fighting? He was convulsing, crying out. What dark magic was in Karpov's words to make him suffer so? It was like something from an old tale, a magic spell, a …

"Seventeen," said Karpov. "Daybreak."

No. Kolya knew something of the techniques that Hydra used to bring the unwilling under its control. It was better to be willing.

"Will we have to have the words before we can fight?" asked Devis.

("Furnace," said Karpov. "Nine. Benign.")

"Perhaps they are to bring him back from the ice," said Nadia. "Perhaps he does not know where he is."

"Perhaps he knows all too well," said Kolya darkly. "He has served Hydra for nearly forty years. Perhaps he is weary."

Josef scoffed. "Perhaps he is old and weak."

("Homecoming. One. Freight-car.")

Kolya did not think the man in the chair looked old or weak at all. He looked like a fighter. He looked like a man who was strong. 

"Good morning, soldier," said Karpov, closing the book.

"Ready to comply," said the Fist of Hydra hoarsely: and now ... now he looked like a defeated man.

*

Josef is wary of the Soldier -- that is how the Colonel refers to him, though they are all soldiers here, even the guards -- until his first session with the man. After that, it's easy. Josef discovers that he is stronger and faster and more ruthless than the Soldier. His only disadvantage is that he doesn't have a metal club attached to his body.

"You need to watch out for that arm," he tells Nurhaci, who's up next. "It's stronger than a human's arm, and it's heavy: don't let him land a punch."

Nurhaci rolls his eyes. "Sure."

"You're not going to have any trouble with him," says Josef, and settles down to watch with the others.

Nurhaci kicks the Soldier right through the bars of the training room. The four wolves on the bench carefully do not smile.

* 

Devis thinks the Soldier looks sad. 

"Maybe he's lonely," he says to Josef one afternoon. "Maybe he --"

"Maybe you're lonely," Josef retorts. "Maybe you're missing Ilya. Maybe you think this fellow's going to be your friend."

"I don't need friends," says Devis, stung. "I've got the fi-- the four of you."

Still, next time they're training together, he decides it's worth a try. 

"Where you from?" he murmurs, up against the Soldier's ear, when they're wrestling. 

"Don't know," says the Soldier, twisting out of Devis's hold and going for his balls. He fights dirty: street-style. But Devis can do that too. He gets the Soldier to scream. Never mind if it's a close thing.

*

"He would be handsome," says Nadia, "if there was a person there."

"He has no soul," says Kolya. "They stole his soul."

Nadia does not agree, but it doesn't do to argue with Kolya when he's waxing mystical. Instead, she flirts with the Soldier: not as though it means anything, not as though anything will come of it (he's probably chemically suppressed in that department, like the rest of them), but just for fun.

Some days she thinks he's flirting back: thinks there's a hint of humour in his ice-blue eyes as he takes her down, thinks she sees the ghost of a smile as she gets him pinned against the wall. But it's only ever ghosts and glimpses, and he certainly doesn't pull his punches just because she's a woman. 

She respects him for that.

*

Nurhaci is trying to work out the Soldier's story. No use in asking him: he won't talk about himself, and seldom about anything at all. But his accent is not Russian (Nurhaci thinks it sounds almost American) and he is old, old. His eyes are old. He has seen many things.   
This is the man who, rumour says, assassinated Stalin. This is the man who killed an American President. This is the man who has slain and stolen for Hydra, and he takes no pride in it. He would be a fearsome opponent to anybody less than the wolves. But you can see that he does not care for Hydra, or for Russia, or for anything except the ice.

He does not join them on their missions. When they return from Ossetia, from Tehran, from Kabul, he is in the cryo chamber, behind his veil of ice.

*

They are roused for another mission. It is good to wake, thinks Kolya, and know that before one sleeps again, there will be good work to be done, and fresh blood on one's hands. Waking is easy: it is nothing like the way the Soldier is woken. There is no screaming. There is no Chair.

He sees that the sixth chamber is empty and dark.

"Comrade Karpov," he says, "is the Fist of Hydra on a mission at last?" For surely such a formidable weapon must be useful for more than simply sparring with the wolf-pack.

"He has been transferred to another facility," Karpov tells them. "To be truthful, he is nearing the end of his usefulness." He smiles at the wolves. "And now that we have you, he is obsolete."

"They will retire him?" says Nadia.

"I believe," says Karpov, "that there will be a final mission for him."

*

The Soldier'd never wanted to see the others, the wolves, again. He wasn't looking forward to taking them down: pretty sure he could do it now, with Steve and Steve's friends on his side, but it wasn't gonna be a whole bunch of laughs. They couldn't be allowed to live. Didn't matter that their lives had never really been their own.

But he hadn't expected to find them all dead. They'd be gutted, he thinks, to have died like that. Nadia with her sly smiles, who fought like a Black Widow and winked at him; Kolya, black eyes and black beard and black heart; Nurhaci who moved like a dancer; Devis, nice kid, who'd tried to make friends at the start of it all; Josef, cunning unpredictable mad bastard.

Disarmed while they slept, dreaming in the ice.

He hopes their dreams were happy ones.

**Author's Note:**

> I started thinking about Karpov's soldiers, and who they might've been, and why Karpov thought that 1991 was a good time to create them. 
> 
> Did you know? Three of the soldiers were played by the leads' stunt doubles: Josef (the only one named in the credits) was played by Jackson Spidell, who's Chris Evans' stunt double; 'Nadia' by Heidi Moneymaker, who's Scarlett Johansson's stunt double; and 'Devis' by Aaron Toney, who's Anthony Mackie's stunt double.


End file.
